This invention pertains to the art of apparatus for the automatic preparation of a food product.
The invention is particularly applicable to the preparation of a crepe food product. However, it will be appreciated to those skilled in the art that the invention could be readily adapted for use in other environments, as, for example, where similar apparatus are employed for the production of food products.
Automated production of food products has increased in recent years in response to increasing demand for fast food products and precooked convenience food products which are offered for sale typically in frozen form for final cooking and preparation at home. A particular demand has arisen for specialty foods of these types, such as crepes.
Crepes are made by placing a filler food product, such as meat, rice, fruits, vegetables, seasonings and combinations thereof, onto a cooked dough sheet and folding the dough sheet to encapsulate the filler food material. Crepes can be folded a variety of ways to encapsulate the filler food product. However, a particularly common method is to fold over portions of the opposed sides of the dough sheet material onto the filler food product and then roll the sheet material onto itself to form a cylindrically configured crepe completely encapsulating the filler food product. An alternate method of folding the crepe includes only rolling up the dough sheet material onto itself, thereby leaving opposed sides of the crepe opened to the filler food material. The latter method is particularly common in the preparation of dessert crepe products. After the dough sheet material has been folded, occasionally the crepe will be cooked to further heat the filler food material and to impart a crispy crust texture to the outer surface of the crepe. Due to the wide variety of available filler food materials to be used in making crepes, a crepe's final form will be somewhat dependent upon offering the crepe and its filler food material in a most appetizing form. In addition, nationality type crepes can be offered in which the filler food material is particularly identified with a certain nationality.
In the past, crepes have generally been prepared completely by hand. The hand operation of precooking the dough sheet material, placing the filler food material onto the individual sheets, folding and forming the crepes, deep frying or otherwise finally preparing the crepe and final packaging has been extremely time consuming, economically inefficient, and demanding a high level of individual skill. As the demand for specialty products, such as crepes, has increased, there has also been a demand for fully automatic apparatus for the continuous preparation of crepe products.
Prior automatic food preparation machines utilizing a filler food material encapsulated in an outer layer of dough or crust have heretofore been suggested and employed in the industry, all with varying degrees of success. Typically, such prior automatic food preparation machines have comprised complex conveyor systems utilizing an assortment of dispensing and heating devices in combination with intricate folding devices. It has been found that the defects present in such machines are such that they have limited economic and practical value.
More particularly, the intricate folding devices incorporated in prior assemblies have been so complex as to require frequent maintenance and are particularly difficult to maintain in a sanitary and clean operation.
The present invention contemplates a new and improved arrangement which overcomes all of the above referred to problems and others to provide a new crepe making machine which is simple in design, economical to manufacture, easy to install, easy to service, eliminates hand cooking, filling and folding operations, automatically and continuously produces crepe products of superior quality and uniformity, and eliminates the sanitation and cleanliness problems inherent in hand production and complex folding machinery.